As state moves toward execution, Ralph Menzies' attorneys appeal to Utah Supreme Court
Ralph Leroy Menzies listens as attorney Eric Zuckerman talks to the judge during a competency hearing in 3rd District Court in West Jordan on Monday, Nov 18, 2024. (Pool photo by Rick Egan/The Salt Lake Tribune)
Attorneys for death row inmate Ralph Menzies have filed an appeal with the Utah Supreme Court, challenging a recent decision that found the 67-year-old convicted killer has dementia, but is still competent enough to be executed.
The news comes as the Utah Attorney General's Office says it plans to move forward with Menzies' firing squad execution, with a hearing set for July 9 to discuss the application for an execution warrant.
An execution warrant, sometimes called a death warrant, is one of the final steps in the process, where the state authorizes the prison to carry out a death sentence after appeals have been exhausted. It's not yet clear how the appeal to the Utah Supreme Court will impact the state's application for an execution warrant.
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Menzies was convicted of murder in 1988 after he kidnapped 26-year-old gas station clerk Maurine Hunsaker from her work and took her up Big Cottonwood Canyon, where she was later found tied to a tree with her throat slashed.
Menzies spent decades on death row, and in recent years his health has deteriorated. After falling several times in prison he was diagnosed with vascular dementia, caused when the brain's blood flow is disrupted, leading to memory loss and declining cognitive function, according to court testimony. An MRI exam showed Menzies' brain tissue is deteriorating, and his balance is fraught, causing him to fall several times each month.
His attorneys say his brain is so damaged that he cannot form a rational understanding of why the state is pursuing the death penalty. The goal of the death penalty — retribution and deterrence — cannot be achieved if Menzies doesn't really understand why he's being executed, they argued.
But attorneys for the state say while Menzies might be suffering from cognitive decline, he doesn't meet that threshold of incompetence. And Utah's 3rd District Judge Matthew Bates ultimately agreed in a ruling issued Friday evening.
Judge says Ralph Menzies does have dementia, but is competent enough to be executed
Menzies' attorneys told Utah News Dispatch they disagree with the ruling and would file an appeal with the Utah Supreme Court. That was made official on Monday, with his attorneys writing they plan to challenge 'the final order finding that despite a proper medical diagnosis of vascular dementia, Mr. Menzies has failed to demonstrate that he is incompetent to be executed.'
In Utah, death row inmates sentenced before May 2004 had a choice between lethal injection and firing squad. Menzies, when he was sentenced in 1988, chose the firing squad. For those sentenced after 2004, the default method of execution is lethal injection, unless the necessary drugs are not available.
The news that Menzies was found competent to be executed was celebrated by Matt Hunsaker, Maurine's son, who told Utah News Dispatch 'my family is very happy to see that we might have some closure coming.'
'We definitely appreciate the fact that it's moving forward, we are in hopes that the flow can continue and we can get an execution date and the death warrant signed immediately,' Hunsaker said on Friday following Bates' ruling.
Menzies' attorney Lindsey Layer, meanwhile, said she respectfully disagreed with the ruling, calling her client 'a severely brain-damaged, wheelchair-bound, 67-year-old man with dementia and significant memory problems.'
'He cannot understand the State's reasons for his execution. His dementia is progressive and he is not going to get better. It is deeply troubling that Utah plans to remove Mr. Menzies from his wheelchair and oxygen tank to strap him into an execution chair and shoot him to death,' Layer said.
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